Page 50 - Chocolate Cake Doctor

L u s c i o u s L a y e r s

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hen we think of birthday hefty loaves into heavenly layers.
cake, we see layers Resembling the famed sponge
stacked one on top of the cakes of Europe, these lighter, airier
other, with a wonderfully cakes were baked in white, yellow,
creamy frosting sandwiched between chocolate, and shades in between. They

and spread around the sides and over were filled with custards and creams,
the top. It seems inconceivable that and they were spread with fluffy but-
cake has ever been anything tercream frostings or cooked
but soft and spongy layers. icings. Some of the most
But layer cakes weren’t famous American cakes—
always the norm. The the devil’s food cake, the
1860s wedding cake recipe carrot cake, the coconut

Henrietta Dull includes in her book cake, the German chocolate
Southern Cooking contains a pound of cake—have sprung from layer pans.
flour, a pound of sugar, whites of six- Today they celebrate holidays, wed-
teen eggs, and twelve ounces of butter, dings, anniversaries, and christenings
and is baked in a loaf in a slow oven. as well as birthdays.
Her Twentieth Century Pound Cake, on Much of the allure of the layer cake
the other hand, is lighter and is baked is the surprise that lies within. When
in layers in a hotter oven. With the new, you cut into a layer cake, you have an
easier-to-control ovens, cakes in the inkling of what may be inside, but

last century were transformed from you’re never quite sure. Thus, the